


Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

by bees_stories



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Related, Dean-Centric, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Related, Free Will, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Season/Series 10, Season/Series 10 Spoilers, desperate times, everything is darkest before the dawn, lying can be a good thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-21
Updated: 2015-02-21
Packaged: 2018-03-14 09:47:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3406103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bees_stories/pseuds/bees_stories
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean has hit rock bottom. Somehow Cas has to find a way to keep him from giving up completely. A Coda to episode 10:14: The Executioner's Song</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

***

"Hey, Cas." Dean was in the process of undressing. He held his shirt in his hands for a moment, as if he wasn't sure what he wanted to do with it. Finally, he tossed it onto a pile with the rest of his laundry. "Did you need something?"

Cas stepped into the room and shut the door behind him. "You squeezed my shoulder as you went past me. I thought you were letting me know that you wanted me to follow." He shrugged. "I followed." 

"Not tonight, Cas. I have a headache." Dean held up his hand. "Sorry. That's an old joke." 

Cas's mouth drew into a flat line for a moment before he replied, "That's not funny." 

Dean's expression was a weary acknowledgment that maybe Cas had a point. "No. I don't suppose it was. But our wires are crossed. I didn't mean anything. Except maybe 'Thanks for being here. For having my back.' I don't tell you that enough." 

It was only a few short steps that separated them. Cas closed the distance. He put his hand on Dean's shoulder. When he squeezed, echoing the gesture that had he had mistakenly taken as a covert signal, the muscles under the skin were taut. He peered into Dean's face and saw the sort of resignation that suggested Sam was right. He really was in trouble. "I'm here now. And I will always have your back."

They held each others' gazes for a long moment as Dean sought and Cas gave the sort of reassurances that couldn't be conveyed with words. 

"He said I'd kill you," Dean said quietly into the heavy silence as he released himself from Cas's one-handed embrace. He stared down at the floor. "He said I'd kill Crowley. And then I'd kill you. And finally, I'd kill Sam." 

"Cain wasn't a prophet," Cas said firmly. "He sensed your reluctance to do what needed to be done. He was goading you by using your fears. It's what demons do." 

"He said it'd hurt a lot when I killed you." Dean's gaze flickered up to catch Cas's eyes before it returned to the floor. 

"More than Crowley. I know." Cas pointed to his ear. "I heard. So did Crowley. It hurt his feelings."

Dean looked up in surprise. "And then I told him I lied to him to get the Blade. Ouch." 

"Crowley sulks," Cas said. "You may want to make amends sooner rather than later." 

Dean shrugged. "I dunno, Cas. I think he's still carrying a torch. Maybe this way he'll finally get the hint I'm just not into him." 

Thinking of Dean and Crowley together was painful, but Cas swallowed his personal feelings. There were bigger things at stake than his insecurities. "You need him as an ally." 

"And how twisted is that?" Dean asked. 

It was a rhetorical question. One that really didn't need a reply. Cas gave Dean a half shrug to acknowledge it was a crazy, mixed up world they lived in, but what could they do? Then he returned to the bigger situation that loomed between them. 

"You're thinking that everything we've done, averting the Apocalypse and what came after, was for nothing." Cas let the words pour out of him. "That's not true, Dean. You weren't destined to kill Sam then, and you're not now. There is no such thing as an inevitable event." He smiled a grim smile in remembrance of all the hard learned lessons. "You taught me that." 

Dean's answering smile was bitter. "Yeah, well it's starting to occur to me that maybe I was wrong. Maybe that's how we get off this crazy train, Cas. I kill Sam and it's game over. No more resets. No more clawing my way out of coffins. Maybe then I can be done. End of the line. The last Winchester standing." He rubbed absently at the Mark on his forearm, and then he realized what he was doing and snatched his hand away. 

"You're tired," Cas said.

"You think?" Dean replied vehemently. "Cas, I'm so beyond tired it's not even funny. I'm sick to the teeth with prophecy and destiny and fate. I just can't do it anymore." 

Cas took a step forward. Dean turned sharply away. "You can't hug this better, Cas. You can't hold me and promise me that tomorrow will be brighter after a good night's sleep, because that's a lie. And you know it, and I know it, and that kind of lie only works if one of us is willing to believe it, and we're both way past that point." 

"Then lets pretend," Cas said as he advanced again. He felt Dean's desperation, and he shared it. He was grasping at straws, and he knew it. But straws were all he had left to work with. "I'll lie to you, and tell you that everything will be okay. And you'll lie to me, with a straight face, and tell me I'm probably right. The shadow of doubt will make the lies more believable." He took a breath and allowed the idea to blossom. "Tomorrow we can tell each other new lies."

"And then what?" Dean asked as if he wasn't sure he was really hearing Cas say the things he was saying. 

Cas shrugged. It was an odd expression that seemed to fit his desperate plan the best, one of many Metatron had force fed into his consciousness. He used it. "Lather. Rinse. Repeat." 

Dean crossed his arms, and once again his fingers strayed to caress the Mark. "We just keep pretending." 

"We do it for Sam," Cas said, using the only bait he knew Dean couldn't resist. "Sam needs to believe that you haven't given up. We'll give him that."

"False hope?" Dean said quietly. "You want me to give Sam false hope?"

"Yes," Cas replied. "You've done it before, when you fought against an inevitable outcome. I want you to do it again." He paused, setting the hook. "Think of it as a final gift. If it comes down to having no choice, that in the end you do kill Sam, let him believe that you fought against your fates until the very last." 

Dean's gaze strayed to the shut door. It was as if he was looking out past it and seeking Sam. Seeing him with his head bowed over a book, or staring into his computer, clicking buttons. Looking hard for solutions that weren't there. 

"Okay. One condition." 

He stared hard at Cas, locking their gazes. "Promise me, Cas. You promise me," Dean's voice came out in a harsh whisper. "that in here, when that door is shut, we can be straight with each other. I can tell you what's really in my head, and you'll do the same." 

Cas nodded. It was what he had wanted all along. "I promise." 

Dean nodded back. "Good. Thanks." He dropped his gaze and rubbed a hand against his face as if agreeing to the plan had taken the last of his energy. 

"You need rest," Cas said. 

He pulled back the bedding and then guided Dean down onto the mattress. When he started to move away, Dean grabbed his wrist. "Don't go." 

Cas nodded. He took off his coat and shoes and then shut out the lights. When he laid down on the bed, Dean curled against his frame, finally accepting the comfort Cas was desperate to give. Within moments, Dean was out. 

_Lather. Rinse. Repeat,_ Cas said to himself.

_Lie and tell more lies and hope the lies somehow become the truth._

It was a very human sort of a plan. It was the sort of plan that made it possible to survive until seconds became minutes. Minutes became hours. Hours became days. Which might, if they were lucky, become weeks, followed by months and years. It was a plan that would help them endure the unendurable. An angel, used to dealing in epochs, would have never conceived such a plan. 

As he held Dean in his arms and listened to the steady sound of his breathing, Cas wondered just what that said about him, who he was, and what he was becoming. 

_Seconds became minutes and minutes turned into an hour._

Cas stroked the side of Dean's face. As his fingers rode gently over a stubble-coated cheek, he decided that his evolution was a good thing. Without it, he would have never have lived from hand to mouth. Warmed himself over burning barrels of trash. Depended on the kindness of strangers. He would never have truly understood what it was like to be isolated and desperate. His experience had given him the insight he needed to come up with his audacious plan.

Dean shifted in his sleep, he cried out, as if threatened. 

Cas shushed him. He gave up a little of his grace so that Dean might find peace. He shut his eyes, knowing that he had done what he could, at least for one night.

Fate, and whatever it had in store for them, would have to wait until tomorrow.

end


End file.
